The present invention relates to a wireless communication system, and, more particularly, to a system for dynamically configuring a multimodal user interface of a portable terminal based on user preferences to facilitate communication with a local appliance.
With the introduction of such wireless application protocols as 3G networks (UMTS, WCDMA) Bluetooth® and wireless fidelity (WI-FI) I.E.E.E. 802.11, there is seemingly no limit to the extent to which portable electronic devices can be employed to interact with wirelessly configured devices encountered by a user. One area in which such interactivity is commonly implemented is within an enterprise network. In WI-FI networks, a suitably configured laptop, PDA or like portable device can communicate with a network when in the range of the wireless signals of the network. In this way, such a network will include wireless nodes so that users who need to have mobile work stations can maintain access to personal preference based enterprise resources from a laptop computer and/or portable digital assistant (PDA) based on his/her preferences hosted by operator (operator affiliates) of this network.
Devices configured to access such enterprise networks will include network signal processing interfaces and employ suitable federated authentication protocols for accessing/exchanging wireless data with the network. The user will typically employ standard graphical user interfaces in accordance with application programs residing in a memory of the device to interact with the resources/functionality of the enterprise network. Yet, as wireless protocols are increasingly implemented for accessing enterprise network technologies, interoperability and cooperability among everyday electronic devices is increasingly desired.
Presently, the wireless capability of portable electronic device while often employed to access networks in a known manner, does not currently offer a flexibility in discovering and communicating with encountered appliances outside of the enterprise environment. For example, a traveling user having a portable electronic device configured for wireless communication local, e.g., Wi-Fi, Bluetooth® and remote 2.5G, 3G cellular networks, encountering an appliance cannot presently interact with the appliance via the local wireless bearer. Further, it is desirable to interact with this appliance by way of a multimodal, dynamically configured interface such as to present the content/functionality appliance in a preferred language or in accordance with user preferences.
As such, a wireless system and related methodology capable of distributing/configuring a multimodal user interface via a service provider network is provided herein, devoid of the aforementioned limitations, and capable of providing a deployable, configurable and interoperable application framework components that aid in hosting, discovering and consuming local appliance services dynamically.